Allison's Wonderland

For the past two 1/2 half weeks all eyes have been focused right on London.  If you don't know what I'm talking about then you've been living in a hole for the past month.  The London 2012 Olympics just finished up and it was a whirlwind of a two weeks.  One of the major reasons I wanted to be in England for the summer was due to the fact that the Olympics were going to be here, and I wanted to be right in the middle of all the mayhem. My goal was to attend an Olympic event, but after all the craziness with the ticketing system, it was not looking like a possibility, or was it? 

Olympic Torch Relay

Waiting for the Torch

I thought it would be so amazing to be here during the Olympics, and really it has been, but there is no coverage of American athletes!  All the news has been focused on team GB, so some of the greatest American Olympic moments have been missed by me.  Kind of sad, but you know, you can't have your cake and eat it too. :)  My Olympic experience all started on Wednesday the 25th of July.  My friends and I were headed into London in order to visit St. Paul's Cathedral, Hyde Park, and to just really make a day of it.  While on the train I started talking to a lady with 4 kids and she said they were going to Wembley to see the Olympic relay.  Well, who wouldn't want to go see the torch?  So I convinced the other girls to go and that was that.  We hopped off the train at Wembleyjust in the nick of time to see the torch pass by.  I also got a free coke out of the deal. :)  I'm not exactly sure who was carrying it that day, but I've never seen the Olympic torch up close and personal.  It was definitely a first and I tried hard to get in the camera shot of the media van that went before the torch.  Not sure if I made it or not, but at least I tried.  That night, Anna and I walked into Trafalgar Square after seeing the Ballet Swan Lake, where a huge Olympic Countdown sign was there to mark the hours in which the Opening Ceremony would commence.  Of course I had to get my picture in front of it.  London was alive with the Olympics, and like I said before everybody was excited.

Trafalgar Square at Night with Olympic Countdown

Opening Ceremony in GX

Olympic Man

Friday night, the 27th of July, marked the night of the Opening Ceremony.  I met up with a bunch of the other Au Pairs and we sat on the grass in the Common along with the rest of the population of Gerrards Cross.  Anna and I got our picture taken with the little Olympic mascot man.  I'm not exactly sure who designed it, but he's weird looking with one eye.  Like really weird.  I don't like him.  We ate food, talked, drank wine and just had a good night.  It was so interesting for me to see because there were probably like 10 of us there, and we all represented different countries.  I have never celebrated the Olympics with people other than Americans so it was really, really cool.  With the 9 of us we represented, France, Poland, Germany, Switzerland, Australia, USA, Spain, and Hungary.  Pretty cool huh?  I was decked out in my red, white, and blue to support team USA amongst all the Brits.  That's when I realized their colors are also red, white and blue.  Hmm...I wonder where we stole that from? Some of us were even patriotic enough to paint flags on our faces in order to represent our countries.  We all had a great laugh because my Aussie friend Tayla decided to put the Aussie flag, along with AUS on her face.  I mean she tried to put AUS on her face, but she put it on in the mirror so instead her face read SUA.  She got her picture in the paper, along with a little clip in the video that was put together and shown at the closing ceremonies event.  

Team USA & Team SUA!

 Unfortunately we sat behind these really obnoxious drunk guys who would comment on absolutely EVERYTHING!  I wasn't even talking to them when I made a comment about how I didn't understand why they were focusing so much on the Industrial Revolution while everyone in the world is focusing on going green.  Also, during the Industrial Revolution there was a lot of child labor, and a lot of negativity.  Granted it did change the way the world was pretty much run, but still lots of pollution and unfair labor treatment.  Anyway, that's when obnoxious man number one turned around and said that the Industrial Revolution created the world.  I just looked at him and said, No, God created the world.  His friend sitting next to him was completely appalled and then proceeded to ask me what planet I was living on.  I just looked at him and said, "The one God created."  God is kind of dead in this country so it really didn't surprise me.  Oh well...it was fun to go through the parade of countries as we were all cheering for different ones.  Australia was one of the first and USA was one of the last, but everybody waited for my country to come by.  That's when I met David. It's kinda cool cause I got to spend the opening ceremony with him and the closing.  

You know how I said tickets were hard to come by?  Well that Sunday, the 29th, my friends and I spent the whole day on the computer at Anna's house.  The tickets would change every hour and we were busting our butts to try and find one event to go too.  We didn't even care what, we just wanted to be apart of London 2012.  That's when I found the Men's Beach Volleyball tickets for 20 Quid a piece.  And if you don't know what Quid is, it's pretty much the English equivalent of "Bucks".  I went to the check out, and that's when it said that the tickets I requested were no longer available.  We had them right in our grasps, but nope!  The ticketing was way off for London 2012.  There were empty seats everywhere and the people of England were in a serious outrage about it.  They even launched an investigation to as why the seats were so empty.    Didn't matter because I still didn't get tickets.  Anna and Sophie landed Women's soccer tickets up at Wembley stadium for 45 pounds a piece to see France vs. Japan.  I had to pass because 45 pounds is more than half of what I make in a week, and I didn't really care to see soccer, let alone watch France vs. Japan.  I still had high hopes as to see an event though. 

Crowds Lining Up

Nelson's Column

The last day of the Olympics rolled around and I had concert tickets to see Blur in Hyde Park along with watching the Closing Ceremony events.  I still hadn't been apart of an Olympic event and was kind of bummed about it, but I knew it just wasn't meant to be.  I was suppose to meet David at 10:30 in front of the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square.  That's when I started to notice more people than normal in the square and the fact there were about 5 helicopters flying over head.  I went to cross the street to get a cup of coffee as David was running late, and that's when I noticed there was also no traffic at all

Waiting for it to Start!

along the street.  That is DEFINITELY unusual for Trafalgar Square.  So I asked the girl sitting next to me at Nero Cafe what was going on.  She then told me that the men's marathon was starting at 11:00 right on the Mall.  I was soo excited!  I hopped up, took my coffee with me and climbed up to the second level of Nelson's Column right in the middle of Trafalgar Square.  I was going to get my Olympic even after all!!  I found a nice comfy spot and got all excited to see the Men's Marathon run by me while I sat on one of the most historic landmarks in London.  It took all of about 30 seconds for them to go by, but I got my picture and I got my video. 

Climbing the Stairs

It was the perfect end to the perfect beginning.  David and I climbed up the 311 steps of the Monument in London City and ended the night watching Blur in Hyde Park along with the closing Ceremony.  I was also able to get Fish & Chips which is something I could never be sick of!  If I'm ever this close to the Olympics again, I will definitely plan to get tickets WAAAY far in advance.  Sometimes you just don't know what curve ball life will throw atcha. :) 

Blur in Hyde Park